Top Democracy News & Analysis
Everyday we provide the top news stories to watch on issues related to voting rights, money in politics, and fair courts.
Federal court uses Supreme Court opinion to uphold Arkansas abortion restrictions (Rebecca Salamacha / JURIST) "A panel of federal judges used a recent Supreme Court opinion to uphold Arkansas abortion restrictions Friday.
The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit upheld the regulations by deferring to Justice Roberts’ concurring opinion in the recently-decided Supreme Court case, June Medical Services L. L. C. v. Russo. By deferring to Justice Roberts’ concurrence, the court applied a more lenient test than tests from previous Supreme Court cases to decided whether a state regulation on abortion is constitutional."
'It's Ridiculous': States Struggle To Accommodate COVID-19 Positive Voters (NPR / Paul Flahive) "With few signs the coronavirus is fading, election officials face an increasingly urgent question: how to accommodate voters who become infected in the days leading up to the election.
In Texas — a state that fought expanding mail-in ballot access all the way up to the Supreme Court — COVID-19 positive voters can be put in the position of choosing between their right to vote and the public's health."
A white person and a Black person vote by mail in the same state. Whose ballot is more likely to be rejected? (Jane C. Timm / NBC News) "... Now, advocates fear that voting changes will put the Black and Latino people suffering the most in the pandemic at risk of losing their voting rights. Young, diverse Americans who have spent the summer mobilizing for racial justice may face the highest barriers to participation, not to mention the millions of Americans facing evictions this summer, for whom voting by mail may well be impossible."
The ‘Blue Shift’ Will Decide the Election (David Graham / The Atlantic) "... This sort of late-breaking Democratic vote is the new, though still underappreciated, normal in national elections. Americans have become accustomed to knowing who won our elections promptly, but there are many legitimate votes that are not counted immediately every election year. For reasons that are not totally understood by election observers, these votes tend to be heavily Democratic, leading results to tilt toward Democrats as more of them are counted, in what has become known as the “blue shift.” In most cases, the blue shift is relatively inconsequential, changing final vote counts but not results. But in others, as in 2018, it can materially change the outcome."
'Dark Money' Campaign Contributions Headed for Record High (Masood Farivar / Voice of America) "Nonprofit organizations and other outside groups that don’t disclose their donors are spending record amounts of money on the 2020 U.S. presidential and congressional races, signaling their growing influence in national politics.
These so-called “dark money” groups so far have funneled at least $177 million to independent political action committees, known as super PACs, in the 2020 election cycle, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based group that tracks money in politics.
By comparison, those groups gave $178 million in the entire campaign cycle two years ago, according to the center. In addition, dark money groups this time have spent more than $19 million on direct political advertising, a figure that is likely to rise as campaigning picks up its pace in the coming months."
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